Well, if you've been reading my Facebook updates, you probably know I fractured my heel and had to have foot surgery. Here's what happened:
I had decided to take a trip to beautiful Cusco and Machu Pichu, because I had a solid week off before I started my 2 hour a day Spanish classes (and my fashion classes weren't starting for about 3 weeks), so I decided it was a good time to go explore a different area of Peru and I was very curious to see if Machu Pichu lived up to the hype of being one of the seven wonders of the world and I wanted to see what was so extraordinary about it that made this tourist mega magnet destination still seem to make it near the top of seemingly everyone's bucket list of places to go before they die.
So, I booked a flight to Cusco (about an hour long flight) and as the plane was descending and this magical, mystical town appeared from beneath the clouds, my crying gene kicked in (thanks Dad), and once again, before I knew it, I had tears (of joy and gratitude) streaming down my face because I was overwhelmed with the lush beauty of Cusco, which made me overcome with emotion because I truly feel so blessed to be here and so happy to have made this reality happen for myself (with the help of several angels in my life like Sergio, my parents, and Joe - all who played crucial roles, on many levels, in enabling me move to Peru). I was blissfully mesmerized with the beauty of the landscape and had never quite seen such a place. I had a strong sense that I had quite an adventure ahead of me in the coming week, in particular.
After getting my luggage and finding a taxi (well, rather, the taxi driver's find you is really more accurate), I handed my driver the piece of paper with the address of my B&B and we were off. The taxi driver was adorable....an older man, native of Cusco, who spoke a bit of English, and to my delight and amusement, he immediately took it upon himself to play tour guide, pointing out various plazas, churches and a few toboggan parks (apparently they like long, fast, winding slides, because we passed a couple different ones on the short drive - looked like big fun). No that's not how I broke my foot.
After winding up quite a few cobblestone streets that were so narrow that the small car barely fit without being in danger of scraping the doors or at least losing the side view mirrors, we arrived at San Blas Plaza and as my new amigo and tour guide stopped the car and placed my luggage on the curb, I realized this was as close as a vehicle could get to my new temporary home away from home (in Lima) away from home (in SF).
Now for those of you that have traveled with me before know (and probably even those of you who know me but haven't traveled with me before could guess), I'm a delightful traveling companion (at least I think I am), but no matter how good my intentions are to travel lightly, it just doesn't happen! Let's just say I like to have options! To make matters worse, being a somewhat practical person and a seasoned traveler, you'd think I would have had the foresight to maybe have, y'know, something sensible like a large backpack, for example. Well, for some inane reason, I still am traveling with this expandable amorphous blob-case on wheels (with a broken strap) that I bought in LA last January and then rather unsuccessfully dragged through 4 different crash pads in NY. Well, the expandable amorphous blob-case is not actually that terrible on the city streets of LA, NY, SF or Lima, but transported to numerous cobblestone steps and steep narrow cobblestone walkways, and it becomes downright comical, if not utterly dumb. At least, I'm pretty sure the two ancient indigenous women at the top of the cobblestone steps leading up from San Blas Plaza were amused by my struggling with this hateful piece of luggage whilst balancing my laptop and carry on bag on my back at the same time. I don't often feel like a stupid American, but this was one of those times. And although you may be thinking, "A ha, this must be how he broke his foot", and although that would be a good guess, I did somehow manage to make it up the steps around the bend, up another path around a corner and up a few more steps to a nondescript door with a small lackluster sign reading....Casa de la Gringa! Thank God, I had found the place.
After ringing the doorbell and waiting a few moments, I was greeted at the door by a friendly Peruvian man who welcomed me and graciously took my luggage off my hands and whisked it away to my room for me. You'd never know it from the exterior of the building, but once inside the Casa, one is transported to a pastel laden oasis of beauty and serenity known as Casa de la Gringa. Here's some pics of it courtesy of the WWW:
So, once I got settled in my room I set out to explore the beautiful town of Cusco and took a few pictures:
I went out that night with an amazing group of people from the B&B. They had just finished doing a 10-day retreat. The leader, Rebecca, puts on retreats all over the world. Yoga and meditation retreats, sports retreats for serious athletes, and the one they just finished was a mystical retreat which included a San Pedro ceremony (a cactus used for healing and religious divination in the Andes Mountains region for over 3000 years) and an Ayahuasca ceremony (a natural psychoactive infusion known by the ancient Shamans as the "spirit of the soul." In 2008, psychology professor Benny Shanon published a controversial hypothesis that a brew analogous to Ayahuasca was heavily connected to early Judaism, and that the effects of this brew were responsible for some of the most significant events of Moses' life, including his vision of the burning bush). Anyways, my new friends had just finished this retreat and they had a few days off before another 10 day retreat started, so we wall went out to a club and heard an amazing band with about eight musicians and singers. We danced the night away.
The next morning, I awoke and looked at my clock and it was 10am exactly. The time that the free breakfast ends. So, I jumped out of bed, threw on some clothes and dashed out of my room to catch breakfast. Well, it's cold in Cusco at night, and I had socks on.....I forgot to mention that my bedroom was on a loft level up a wooden ladder. I ran out of the room and before I had a chance to climb down the ladder, my sock encased foot immiediately slipped off of the top wrung of the ladder, and as I was grasping for something, anything, to grab onto, I fell backwards and landed hard on my heel and then onto my ass with a loud thud.
I sat quietly in shock for a few moments not really knowing what had hit me. I didn't yet feel much pain because of the adrenaline and shock, so I slowly started to get up and as I started to put a little weight on my left foot, excruciating pain shot up and down my leg. I knew something was terribly wrong. Another guest from the B&B happened to walk by and she helped me hop over to the lounge area. I told them I needed to see a doctor. They gave me an ice pack and I put my leg up and waited a couple hours for the doctor to arrive on his house call. By the time the doctor arrived, my foot had swelled up to the size of a small nerf football. I got on piggy back on someone's back as he walked me down the steps and alleys to the doctor's car and 2 hospitals, an x-ray, and a cat scan later, I was diagnosed with a fractured heel....
Here's a pic of the fateful ladder I fell from (a good 6 or 7 feet)
The road to recovery begins in my next chapter.......
